The First Word: Sleeping Bags

On this day — the House takes up HB1 and the 371 amendments filed on it; the politics of the Rainy Day Fund vote last night; the Senate adds more spending to its budget proposal; the roads funding crisis isn’t looking any better; campus-carry legislation leaves committee in the Senate.

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***371 Amendments To Go

The House will begin debating its version of the 2012-2013 budget early this morning. Republican leaders have promised to make a marathon of the proceedings that many in the press corps expect to last well into the weekend. The basics of the budget are well known; it provides about $23 billion less in public spending than is necessary to maintain current levels of service. The cuts come mostly from public education, universities and aid to the poor and elderly. The House budget will not pass the Senate, which has been busy working on their less austere proposal.

BRIEF BACKGROUNDER — Why is the government cutting spending to those programs? Because they account for about 90% of all state spending. If you aren’t going to increases taxes, you have to chop away at the state’s big-ticket items, which is exactly what House Republicans have done.

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***Defunding the Public Integrity Unit

In that massive stack of amendments to the House budget, you’ll find a proposal to defund the Public Integrity Unit at the Travis County District Attorney’s Office. Yes, that office – the one that convicted Rep. Kino Flores and former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. Texas Monthly’s Nate Blankslee reports:

But he may not need one to get the revenge Republicans have been seeking. That’s because one of Zedler’s proposed HB 1 amendments, a seemingly simple half-page item (on page 251 of the stack) moving funding for the Public Integrity Unit over to the AG’s office, contains what appears to be a cleverly couched sneak attack.

The amendment provides that funding for the unit will be moved to the AG’s office only if HB 1928 is passed into law and the unit’s duties are officially transferred out of the D.A.’s office. Careful readers will note, however, that this contingency provision is inserted only midway through the amendment.

The first part of the amendment, which zeroes out the funding for the Public Integrity Unit in the Travis County D.A.’s office, is not contingent on passage of HB 1928. So even if HB 1928 dies and Zedler fails to get the unit moved to the AG’s office, passage of the amendment–according to a couple of budget veterans I consulted–will still zero out funding for the salaries of everybody who works in the Public Integrity Unit at the D.A.’s office. Small consolation for Tom Delay, perhaps, but a score will have been settled.

An informal survey of Republican rookies would suggest they’re holding firm as floor debate continues into the weekend, although some hint they are softening a bit on campaign promises about not dipping into the rainy day fund.

They’re holding firm despite rear-guard amendments from beleaguered House Democrats and despite concerns expressed by folks back home about teachers losing jobs, nursing homes closing and college financial aid withering. The $164.5 billion budget that passed out of Pitts’ Appropriations Committee is about $8 billion short of what’s needed to finance public education. It is about $6 billion short of what state Medicaid officials have said they need.

“I’m with Pitts,” said Rep. Dan Huberty, R-Houston, who has emerged as something of a leader among the newcomers, in part because of his prior experience as president of the Humble school board.

“Aren’t we big boys?” Huberty asked. “Don’t we have to make tough decisions?”

- The Austin Bureau’s Nolan Hicks reports that an updated report by the Transportation Commission’s 2030 Committee shows that the massive hole in the state’s transportation budget hasn’t gotten any smaller.

- The Statesman’s Ralph Haurwitz interviewed Governor Rick Perry and asked him about the recent controversial hire and fire of Rick O’Donnell, a special advisor to the Board of Regents, who wrote many of the white papers that became the foundation for a controversial overhaul of A&M’s research program. Perry called the controversy “a waste of time.”